Barry Moss Movies
A rich but bigoted man is forced to confront his ugliest prejudices face to face in this thriller. Frank Kramer (John Rubinstein) is a successful but narrow-minded attorney who comes home one day to discover that his daughter Nicole (Rhea Silver-Smith) is missing. Kramer shortly receives a telephone call from someone who claims to be holding his daughter hostage and gives him instructions to visit a pay phone in one of the most crime-ridden ghettos in New York City. Furious, but too worried not to follow orders, Kramer does as he's told and takes a call at the public phone -- only to be told to go to another phone booth in another, equally dangerous part of town. As Kramer dashes from telephone to telephone while being confronted by muggers, drug dealers, prostitutes, and angry people who simply don't want him in their neighborhood, it becomes evident that the kidnappers aren't just interested in money -- they have a personal grudge against Kramer, and they want their revenge to be psychological as much as financial. In time, Kramer discovers that he does indeed know one of the kidnappers -- Ruby (Amber Kain), the daughter of Kramer's maid, who has pulled the job with the help of her boyfriend -- and he discovers that his ex-wife is no more sympathetic to him than Ruby and her partner. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- John Rubinstein, Amber Kain, (more)
- 1992
- PG13
Two people fleeing different sorts of danger find one another in this screwball romantic comedy from France. Danny (Edouard Baer) is a professional magician who has been struggling to find work and has somehow managed to get on the wrong side of his emotionally unstable brother-in-law Max (Joey Starr). With Max eager to hurt him, Danny decides to leave town, and drops his aging and senile mother (Bulle Ogier) off at a mental hospital, where he meets Sonia (Melanie Bernier), who seems a bit too interested in the opposite sex. As Danny hits the road, he picks up at attractive hitch-hiker, Irene (Nathalie Baye), who is carrying a large purse and gets frequent phone calls from men Danny assumes are her current or former lovers. But Danny doesn't know the half of Irene's story -- she's the paramour of a powerful politician (Guy Marchand) who has become involved in an illegal deal to sell arms to North Korea, and Irene is carrying both the politician's cash and evidence of his wrongdoings. Irene is also involved with a well-connected Korean gentleman (Park Jung-hak) and is dodging calls from both her lovers as she and Danny motor away in search of relative safety, and it isn't long before the traveling companions become attracted to one another. Passe-passe (aka Off And Running) also stars Maurice Benichou, Sandrine Le Berre and Hippolyte Girardot. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Cyndi Lauper, David Keith, (more)
Sammy Bodean is the newest, most promising recruit according to the advertisement of the California Angels--and has to prove it come game time. Following the team's sale to young business whiz Gil Lawrence (Terry Kinney), ex-player Virgil Sweet (Edward James Olmos) has to prove himself as the team's talent scout to keep his job. Via a car break-down near a small farm-town in Idaho, Virgil stumbles across young Sammy Bodean (Jeff Corbett) who performs mean pitching skills in a rural sandlot. After bringing Sammy to LA where he pitches out the team's best, owner Gil begins a massive media campaign in which he appears in a press conference and not only brags of the boy's talent but of his intention to feature him--without warm-up or orientation--in the big game the following week. Virgil, though promoted to assistant manager, is upset at Gil's exploitative measures to save the slagging Angels at the expense of Sammy. Game day arrives and the pressure is on to keep the other team swinging, which causes young Sammy to choke. Or not. ~ Kristie Hassen, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Edward James Olmos, Lorraine Bracco, (more)
Dominick Luciano (Thomas Hulce) is the moderately retarded twin brother of highly intelligent young intern Eugene (Ray Liotta). Anxious to become a successful doctor, Eugene finds he must devote most of his time to caring for Dominick. For his part, Dominick has been contributing to the family unit as a trash collector; in fact, it is his earnings that keeps food on the table. All Dominick wants out of life is a house by the lake where he and his brother can be together for all time. But the ambitious Eugene can't always bring himself to share that vision. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Tom Hulce, Ray Liotta, (more)
- 1987
Cliff (Bill Cosby) takes his daughter Rudy (Keshia Knight Pulliam) and two of her friends to a vaudeville tribute featuring such vintage performers as "The Great Ballantine" (Carl Ballantine, reprising the comedy magic act which regaled decades of The Ed Sullivan Show) fans. Unfortunately, the kids are bored stiff by the sparsely attended show--until emcee Eddie Bartholomew (played by master mime Bill Irwin) goes into his eye-popping routine. Elsewhere, Vanessa's former boyfriend Robert (Dondre T. Whitfield) scares off yet another prospective date by impulsively proposing marriage. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1986
Danny Kaye guest stars as Dr. Burns, a puckish dentist who tries his best (and then some) to allay the fears of Rudy's friend Peter (Peter Costa) when the boy balks at sitting in Burns' chair to have a toothache treated. And back at the Huxtable house, Cliff (Bill Cosby) suffers sleep deprivation thanks to the loud and incessant outrage expressed by Clair (Phylicia Rashad) over a newspaper article. This episode was originally telecast on a Sunday, rather than The Cosby Show's usual Thursday-night timeslot, as a lead-in to the NBC miniseries Peter the Great. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1985
The marriage of John Lennon and Yoko Ono is fodder for this television biography, which covers the couple's relationship from Lennon's days as a Beatle in 1966 to his 1980 murder on the streets of New York City. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide
Broadway's celebratory musical about rejection makes it to the screen in a fizzless adaptation by Richard Attenborough that misses the whole point of the Broadway show -- i.e. the dancing and the dancers. Instead, the dancers become a limp Greek chorus for the dead love affair between a choreographer, Zach (a pre-Gordon Gekko Michael Douglas) and his old flame, Cassie (Alyson Reed) the star dancer. Zach is holding try-outs for a new Broadway musical and, as armies of dancers are brought on stage to audition for Zach, he sits in the darkened recesses of the theater, puffing on a cigarette, as he winnows out hopeful dancers who want to become part of the chorus line for Zach's new show. Finally, Zach has reduced the dancers to 16 men and women, and he asks each of them to step to the footlights and tell him about their lives and their dreams. But backstage, while the dancers are confessing their pasts to Zach, Zach's past walks through the stage door. Cassie, Zach's ex-lover, whom Zach met, courted and broke up with in the theatrical environs, has returned. Once a big star, Cassie has returned to the theater -- not to see Zach but to audition for Zach's musical. She needs the work. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Michael Douglas, Terrence Mann, (more)
Abby (Lori Loughlin) and her brother, Loren (Shannon Presby), seem to have it all: good looks, lots of friends, and a great relationship with their loving mom and their heroic, discipline-minded military dad. When their folks are killed in a car crash, however, the siblings must move to small-town Florida to live with their sweet but cash-impaired Uncle Charlie (Ed Jones) and Aunt Fay (Lucy Martin), who own a gas station and a struggling, bargain-bin amusement park. For Abby and Loren, life in the Sunshine State proves to be a mixture of hard work, new faces, and harassment at the hands of drug-dealing, skirt-chasing local scion Dutra (James Spader) and his gang of trailer-park psychopaths. Dutra places a bet with the wiry, reptilian Gideon (John Philbin) about which of the young villains will be able to bed Abby first, leading to a series of increasingly vile sexual come-ons. Abby, however, has other romantic ideas involving a kindly boy named Mark (Eric Stoltz). Between bouts of defending his sister's honor, Loren finds a similarly wholesome romance with pretty, blond Karen (Paige Lyn Price). With the help of these new friends, Loren and Abby make some headway in the local social hierarchy, but their skirmishes with Dutra and his minions escalate, climaxing with attempted rape, kidnapping, and bumper-car violence on the night of a high-school dance. Director Sean S. Cunningham also directed the original Friday the 13th. ~ Brian J. Dillard, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Shannon Presby, Lori Loughlin, (more)
In the first film of brothers Joel Coen and Ethan Coen, M. Emmett Walsh plays Visser, an unscrupulous private eye hired by Texas bar owner Marty (Dan Hedaya) to murder Marty's faithless wife Abby (Frances McDormand) and her paramour, Ray (John Getz), one of Marty's employees. But Visser is no more up-front with Marty than with anyone else; he makes some slight modifications of the original plan so that it better serves his own best interests. After a surprise double-cross and the murder of one of the important players, matters spiral out of control, and the plot gyrates through a complicated string of darkly humorous events. False assumptions, guilt, and fear all lead to a frantic attempt to conceal evidence and the heart-pounding, irony-filled denouement. Blood Simple was re-released in the summer of 2000 with a digitally-remastered soundtrack and -- at the Coens' behest -- a few minutes of dialogue trimmed. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- John Getz, Frances McDormand, (more)
This made-for-television movie is a filmed version of the Bob Fosse musical hit of the same name. William Katt stars in the title role of this fictionalized story of Pippin, the son of Charlemagne who sets out to find meaning in life and discovers his true self along the way. Ben Vereen appears in his Tony Award-winning role. ~ Bernadette McCallion, All Movie Guide
- 1981
- R
Based on a novel by Scott Spencer, Endless Love details the doomed romance between 17-year-old David (Martin Hewitt) and 15-year-old Jade (Brooke Shields). Banished from Jade's home by her daddy Hugh (Don Murray), David obsessively cooks up a scheme to get back into the family's good graces. Since this plan involves setting Jade's house on fire, one can easily predict that the puppy-love romance is in for a bumpy ride. Jailed for arson, David heads directly to Jade the moment that he's released, with tragic results. Posting respectable earnings thanks to the popularity of Brooke Shields, Endless Love was also the film debut of Tom Cruise, billed 18th in the cast list. A young James Spader lends a supporting role. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Brooke Shields, Martin Hewitt, (more)
